


Vaani

by Golden_Daughter



Category: Baahubali (Movies)
Genre: Epistolary, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-07 19:06:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19091248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Golden_Daughter/pseuds/Golden_Daughter
Summary: Voices of the unheard, describing their world from their eyes.Title: Vaani (Sanskrit) Voice





	1. Vkyaktitva

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CarminaVulcana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarminaVulcana/gifts).



> Written for the Baahubali Summer Challenge, for the Week 2: Bhumi.  
> Title: Vyaktitva (Sanskrit)- Identity, Personhood.

Dear Maya,

This is Kalyavan. I had the unfortunate “opportunity” to know exactly what the people of the North thought of our tribe. When you had advised me to eschew the traditional Kalakeya ornaments and instead dress myself like them, I had only humored you. It is after meeting those Northern people that I understood the necessity of such a disguise.

Maya, those men and women really have their heads screwed on backwards! Not literally, of course, but metaphorically. They think that “avarna” people are savages. Seriously?!?  Savages? Where, I ask, is the savagery in the equality of the tribe, where everyone is equal to the other, only bowing to God and the Chief? Why is that they have no idea of our culture, that everything even slightly different to their world-view is “savagery”? I can understand now why our honored ancestors broke apart from Mahishmatian domination all those years ago. Maya, it truly must have been the Age of Darkness. Our people forced to forswear our culture, our very identities, what a nightmare!! Why can they not see that we, too, are the same as them where it fundamentally matters?

Yes, our ancestors are from across the Great Sea, and they carried our culture with them, but, at the end of the day, we are all human. We too have our Gods, our traditions, our culture, our humanity.

No matter what, for the people of the so-called “Ultimate Utopia” everyone else is inferior. Everything there counts in the terms of grandeur, not in terms of the heart put into endeavors, of purity of soul. Oh, they say that it matters, but it is obvious to see that it doesn’t. What matters to them is their system of oppressing people, their varna.

I’d prefer our simple existence to their gilded golden cages any day, Maya. Our earthy citadels, our open-air courts, all close to Prithvi maa. Our joyful festivals, celebrating life, and not status. Our councils hear all our voices, unlike theirs. We give human status to everyone, unlike them. It is my excellent luck that I am Kalakeya, not Mahishmatian.

Do they do the same to your people, the Malwis? Gods, how do you bear it?

Yours in solidarity,

Kalyavan.


	2. Ch-2: Manushyatva

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maya replying to Kalyavan, revealing snippets of her own thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title means- Humanity (Sanskrit)

Dear Kalyavan,

I am truly sorry that you had to find that particular ugly truth the way you did. You’re right about the people of Mahishmati. They behave like they are oh-so-high and mighty, but they are, in reality, worse off than we. They are lucky that we are people of the book, adhering to non-violence. Unfortunately, sometimes I rue that we cannot raise our weapons even when we want to. Mayhaps, someone will bring change. Mayhaps, that someone could even be me.  Who knows? The future, unknown as it is, is in our hands, after all.

Only recently, Subhathra from Udayagiri, my childhood friend from when I had gone on an import expedition with my parents to her land, had visited me.

She had arrived in the midst of our yearly Spring festival and we had spent many hours by the sea, talking of different cultures we have known. Did you know, the people of Udayagiri too originate from across the sea, much like your people? There were many elements of Udayagiri culture that were similar to yours, from the style of agriculture to the citadel building your people and theirs do.

Oh, and thank you for that painstakingly preserved Pink Rose! It meant a lot that you remembered that the flower is the symbol of our people, our chief told me to convey his regards to you too.

That reminds me. Kalyavan, even as Subhathra railed with me against the unfairness of Mahishmati dominion, something you people are fortunate to have escaped, she also told me some…disturbing news of the Kalakeya people. Are you all fine? Perhaps, these are only rumors we heard. You’ll tell me if anything is amiss, won’t you? Remember, I am always with you, in whatever ways I can be.

Anyway, let’s talk of happier matters. Do you know that the Uttara Phalguni star started her ascent during our Spring festival? It is said that the star is the guardian spirit of our people, and it portends good omens for us if she ascends during this time.

I hope that at least a silver of the luck she’ll bring us is also with you.

Subhathra also sends her regards (she was very interested to know about you.)

Yours in solidarity

Maya.


	3. Upkarparatha

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kalyavan's saga of loss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title means humanity. (Sanskrit)

Dear Maya,

I…don’t know what I can tell you. Suffice to say that my beloved home is not as I once remembered so fondly. Our chief is no more. Kalakeya turn against Kalakeya in a massacre not known of in recent history. Inkagoshi annihilated his so called “rival-clans”. I and ma along with a few others escaped by the skin of our teeth, and we do not know what to do now. All is lost. Family, tribe, pride…nothing is left intact.

However, regardless of how I feel, I must project a façade of hope, Maya, because all those of us who escaped elected me as their leader. I cannot fail. I will not.

Maya, I and the other youths here are struggling to survive, but we will not give up. Our honored ancestors cannot be let down like that. We sought refuge in the forests near Udayagiri at kaka’s suggestion, for he had been the ambassador to Udayagiri in bygone days. His is a familiar face to them.

You were right, you know. Udayagiri and Kalakeya were one in ancient days, when the sea had not separated Malwa from the rest of Jambudwipa. When the sea rushed in, it seems he had brought mountains with him. We Kalakeya had held to the forests, and the Udayagiri people had made the new mountains their home.

I did meet your friend. Subhathra. She is a breath of fresh air amongst all this grief and loss. The people of Udayagiri are very welcoming to us, but I still miss the air of home. We are surviving here, but not really living, not when we live in fear of losing ourselves. No amount of excuses will ever absolve us of this, old friend.

Maya, Mahishmati has not wrecked on us what we have done to ourselves.

But, there is an unquenched fire in those of us who yet live. We will wrest our homeland back from that black-souled poor excuse for a man. We will not let the rich legacy of the Kalakeya culture by besmirched for long by that worm, we will not! We’ll survive, and we will triumph, I swear by Kaalaa Bairavaa with all my ancestors as witness and my immortal soul on the line.

Kalyavan.

 


End file.
